Facebook Hustles: The Hidden Mechanics of a Scam Machinery

Following a month-long investigation, Check First documented a large-scale scam operation that recruited victims through more than 1,500 Facebook advertisements linked to a network of fake media websites impersonating established outlets such as Le Monde, the BBC, and Süddeutsche Zeitung.

The operation relied on a three-tier Facebook page structure: a first tier posting viral, engagement-driving content, a second tier reposting that content to recruit audiences, and a third tier — made up of compromised creator and artist pages obtained through social-engineering "collaboration" offers — that hosted the actual scam ads. The fake media sites carried what appeared to be account-creation or sign-up forms but functioned as data-harvesting tools; collected contact details were then used to phone victims and pressure them into transferring money through fictitious investment platforms, in a scheme the report labels the "Tony Terry Scam," which primarily targeted artists and creators.

The report concludes that this scale of coordinated, ad-driven fraud demonstrates ongoing gaps in Meta's enforcement of its own advertising and platform policies, and raises questions about compliance readiness ahead of the EU's Digital Services Act.